My father, George Grenville, the first Marquess of Buckingham, is a strong supporter of the deposed French monarchy and gave them shelter at our house in Gosfield, Essex. Our “French colony” comes to visit in January 1808 and oak trees are planted around the Keeper’s Lodge, which is now known as the Bourbon Tower. The King is anxious to reward the labourers, but he cannot have anticipated the comic result, which Betsey Fremantle records in her diary:

Louis XVIII having ordered wine and ale to be distributed to the Labourers who had planted the Oaks yesterday, they all passed before the House in their way to the Clumps, forming a ludicrous Procession, some with Spades, forks, or rakes, some driving wheelbarrows, and with other gardening implements, the Band playing before them, they marched into the Park where ministers had assembled, to drink the King’s health, I walked to the spot with Ly. Buckingham, but was caught in a violent storm of rain.

Richard Temple